“What?” said Jorge.
“This Lord Caliban person that you all speak in such hushed tones about. I went looking to see what happened to him.” She thumped the stack of papers. “There’s a trial record, he’s remanded to local custody, somebody scrawls a note that says, Ask the captain of the guard, and then absolutely nothing. Your cautionary tale could be running around loose somewhere, and nobody has ever followed up?”
“Uh,” said Jorge. “Um. This isn’t really my field. I just kill demons. You want to talk to one of the senior priests—"
“Who do you think I got the papers from?”
Shane started to laugh. His ribs were sore but he didn’t care.
“Right.” Jorge stood up. “I should probably go…uh…check on something…”
“Wait,” said Shane, a thought striking him. Jorge paused and raised his eyebrows inquiringly. “In
the courtyard. Marguerite said that I said something. But what was it?”
An odd light flickered in Jorge’s eyes. “You don’t…no, of course you don’t know. Everyone heard something different.”
“Oh.” Shane hadn’t expected that. “That’s why you knew it was the Dreaming God speaking?”
“We would have known that it was the God anyway.” Jorge rapped his knuckles on the doorframe.
“There was no doubt at all. I’ll go check on that food, shall I?”
Shane sagged back in his chair, feeling suddenly exhausted despite having been awake for less than an hour. “Huh.”
“He’s right, you know,” said Marguerite. “There really wasn’t any doubt. You’re good at the voice, but not that good.” She rose to her feet. “Most of the paladins who were there won’t tell anyone what they heard. Just that it was for them alone.”
“Huh.” It made a certain kind of sense. Perhaps if You could rarely speak directly to mortals, You seized the opportunity when you had it. A little rawness in his soul was a small price to pay for that, surely.
“Did you hear something too?” he asked. “You don’t have to tell me what it was.”
“I did,” said Marguerite. To Shane’s surprise and delight, she sat on the arm of the chair and leaned against him, her hip against his side and her cheek against the top of his head. “He told me to have faith.”
FIFTY-FOUR
“YOU HAVE A VISITOR, MISTRESS FLORIAN,” said the very young acolyte of the White Rat. “She’s waiting in the small courtyard.”
“A visitor?” Marguerite raised her eyebrows. “Me?”
“I did not realize anyone knew that you were here,” Shane murmured.
She glanced up at him and felt an involuntary smile curve her lips. Look at me, mooning around like a teenager. It must be positively disgusting to watch. “Oh, a few people do, I’m sure. It’s not as if it’s a secret. But I don’t know anyone who would need to be announced, instead of just showing up.”
“She did not give her name,” the acolyte said. Marguerite and Shane followed him through the bustling halls of the temple, dodging law clerks and supplicants.
Marguerite would not have expected to enjoy spending time in a temple, but the last few weeks had been surprisingly peaceful. They had escorted Ashes to Archenhold, accompanied by multiple paladins, and then the Bishop had extended the Rat’s hospitality until, as she said, “the Sail realizes just how much trouble it’s in.” Marguerite had been touched, and more than a little grateful. She could have stayed with Grace, of course, but she did not want to put her friend in any danger—and the Rat’s temple, as she knew well, was surprisingly difficult to infiltrate.
I would probably feel different if it was a temple of the Dreaming God. I’m still a little miffed at them. Although I swear to their god, I’m going to fix that spy network if it kills me.
…oh, who am I kidding? I could probably be happy in a temple of the Hanged Mother, if Shane was there with me.
He reached out and took her hand as they walked, and she felt a by-now familiar rush of affection.
She kept waiting for the feeling to wear off. It kept not doing so.
The acolyte halted at the entrance to the small courtyard and bowed them through. Marguerite took two steps inside and stopped as if she’d run into a brick wall. Her fingers closed tightly on Shane’s.
“Peace,” said Fenella, raising one hand. “I’m only here to talk.” The older woman sat at a little table, sipping a cup of tea, her embroidered shawl loose around her shoulders, exactly like the fabric-buyer from Baiir that she had pretended to be in the Court of Smoke. Perfectly relaxed and perfectly
harmless: Marguerite doubted either one was true.
She dropped Shane’s hand and sat down across the table, already cursing herself for having let her alarm show. “I admit that I am surprised to see you here,” she said.
“I was in the area,” Fenella said, taking a sip of tea. “I thought perhaps we might speak.”
“Mmm.” Marguerite wished that she had a teacup to sip from, but would not have trusted anything served to her. She sensed Shane taking up his accustomed guard position and took comfort from it.
“What shall we speak of, madam?”
“Salt.” Fenella set her cup down and steepled her fingers. “It would seem that there is soon to be a great deal more of it about.”
“I’ve heard rumors to that effect, yes.”
One corner of Fenella’s mouth crooked up. “I think there’s little point in either of us being coy.
You won, we lost. That’s all there is to it.”
Marguerite inclined her head, accepting this tribute. “It was a near thing,” she said, “and hinged entirely on luck.”
“Luck is what you make it. No, I think you played the game better than I did.” Fenella pulled her shawl more tightly around her shoulders. “It would not have occurred to me to hide an artificer among demonslayers. I daresay that was inspired. We could not move against them, or risk every man’s hand turned against us.”
“Also luck,” Marguerite repeated. “It did not occur to me either, until there was an actual demon.”
“Ah. Not good luck, then.”
“Not precisely, no.” Marguerite glanced toward the entrance to the courtyard. The acolyte was still standing there, just out of earshot. He looked bored. Good, someone to run for help if she suddenly whips out a dagger and stabs me.
“Mmm.” Fenella took another sip of tea. “At the end of all this, I find that the only question I have is ‘Why?’”
“Why?”
“Why put yourself in such mortal danger for such a risky proposition? Why oppose us so fiercely at all?” Her eyes were hooded, but not hostile. “I have dug through everything we know of you, Marguerite Florian, which is a good deal. Yet I can find no secret backers, no master who you might serve. Except perhaps the Rat—” she gestured toward the walls of the courtyard, “—and they would not have masterminded something like this. So I decided that I would ask you. Why?”
“Because I wanted the Sail to leave me alone. That’s all.”